Prayer of the People, 9 June 2019
Pentecost Sunday
Heavenly Father,
We enter into your communion — the communion of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit — with deep gratitude for the love you have shown to all Creation in the life and death of Jesus Christ. It is by His blood that we have been ushered into your presence. It is by your Spirit that we have been brought into a dynamic and living relationship with you.
Thank you.
Thank you for causing us to stand in your grace.
Thank you for granting us forgiveness of sin without merit.
Thank you for cleansing us of that which generates so much shame.
Thank you for destroying the works of the evil one.
Thank you for creating new life in us.
Thank you for bringing us into a family of believers.
Thank you for putting a new song in our hearts.
Thank you for sustaining us in the night.
Thank you for revealing your purposes to us.
Thank you for giving us daily bread.
Thank you for carrying us when we feel so weak.
Thank you.
You have caused your face to shine on us. Though we may fear that our neighbours will despise us, may your glory be through us life for the nations and to our neighbours. May your salvation be the joy of their hearts and the firmness of their steps. May your love bring health to their bones. May your Word proclaimed humbly from our mouths be truth that sets them free.
Oh Father, we grieve with First Nations communities in Canada over the state of women and children. Bring comfort and bring justice. It’s not just our cities and highways that need your new humanity — its our hearts and minds. We repent of seeing with contempt. We repent of not seeing. We repent of seeing and not caring. We repent of thinking “not my problem.” We repent of our hardness of heart. Please send your Spirit like fire to illuminate our hearts so we do not walk about in darkness and stupid complicity.
We need wisdom from heaven to align our disordered affections with you. The violence of the past has sows seeds of pain that grow today. We need healing in the land O Lord. With shameless audacity we come knocking on the doors of heaven — Fill us with your Spirit.
We set our lives before you and so we pray as Jesus teaches us:
(Please join me in the Lord’s Prayer)
Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name,
your kingdom come,
your will be done,
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us today our daily bread.
And forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors.
And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from the evil one;
for yours is the kingdom,
and the power, and the glory,
forever.
Amen.